Alpha's Poisoned Scheme

The first full moon after Alexander's announcement came with a bitter chill. I stood at our bedroom window, watching as he dressed in ceremonial robes that I'd never seen before—silver-trimmed with the pack's emblem embroidered in platinum thread.

'Another meeting with the Moonstone Pack?' I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.

Alexander adjusted his cufflinks—a habit I'd noticed more frequently these days. 'Alliance negotiations require careful attention, Sarah. You understand that.'

'It's the third full moon ceremony you've missed with Lily.' My fingers unconsciously traced the scar along my side. 'She asks about you.'

He paused, his Alpha aura pulsing subtly through the room. 'This alliance protects her future. Surely that matters more than one night's ritual.'

Before I could respond, he was gone, leaving behind only the lingering scent of pine and authority. I sank onto the edge of our bed, the mattress cold where he should have been.

* * *

Lily's small hand tugged at my nightgown as I tucked her into bed that night. Her wide eyes reflected the moonlight streaming through the curtains—eyes so like her father's that it sometimes hurt to look at them.

'Why doesn't Alpha daddy come home anymore?' Her voice trembled, small fingers clutching her stuffed wolf toy.

The question pierced me like a silver blade. I swallowed hard, smoothing her dark curls away from her forehead. 'Daddy has important Alpha business, sweetheart. He's making sure our pack stays strong.'

'But the moon is calling,' she whispered, her three-year-old instincts already attuned to the lunar pull. 'Doesn't he hear it?'

I hummed an ancient pack lullaby, the melody catching in my throat as I wondered the same thing. What call was stronger than the moon? Than us?

* * *

The second full moon came with rain that lashed against the windows of the pack house. Alexander had left before dawn, his side of the bed already cold when I woke.

Dinner that night was a quiet affair, just Lily and me in our isolated wing of the pack house. As she pushed her food around her plate, I made a decision.

Closing my eyes, I reached for the pack mind-link—the telepathic connection that bound our wolves together. I hadn't attempted to use it in months, not since Alexander had 'adjusted' my access for our protection.

'Elena? Marcus?' I called silently to my old training partners, warriors I'd once fought beside. 'Can anyone hear me?'

Instead of voices, there was only static—a wall of white noise that pressed painfully against my consciousness. I gasped, clutching the edge of the table as the connection fizzled and died.

'Mommy?' Lily's worried voice pulled me back. 'Your eyes went yellow.'

I blinked rapidly, feeling my wolf retreat in confusion and hurt. 'It's nothing, baby. Just a headache.'

But it wasn't nothing. It was confirmation. My access hadn't been 'adjusted'—it had been severed.

* * *

By the third full moon, a desperate need for answers drove me to the archive chamber. The room smelled of dust and old parchment, holding the records of every pack member's history and status.

I moved silently through the shelves, fingers skimming over labeled files until I found the warrior section. Five years ago, my name had been listed among the elite—Sarah Mitchell, Future Gamma, top of her training class.

The file drawer labeled 'M' slid open with a soft scrape. I rifled through the folders: Mason... Matthews... Miller... but no Mitchell. My breath caught as I pulled out the entire drawer, searching frantically.

There, at the very back, was a thin folder with my name. I opened it with trembling hands, only to find a single sheet of paper inside. Where my training records, commendations, and status reports should have been, there was only a stamp in bold red letters: 'CLASSIFIED BY ALPHA ORDER.'

My past had been erased. My future as a Gamma—the position I'd worked toward my entire life—deleted as if it had never existed.

I leaned against the shelves, the cold metal pressing into my back as a terrible clarity washed over me. The isolation, the severed mind-links, the missing records—they weren't protecting me from external enemies.

They were ensuring I remained exactly where Alexander wanted me: hidden, dependent, and completely under his control.

And for the first time in five years, I wondered if the mate bond I'd felt—the one I'd sacrificed everything for—had ever been real at all.